"Every man in business . . . issued promissory notes, varying in value from the sum of fourpence to twenty shillings, payable on demand. These notes received the appellation of paper currency. . . . The pound sterling represented twenty-five shillings of the paper-money."
(2) Obsolete name for those colonially-born.
1827. P. Cunningham, `Two Years in New South Wales,' vol. ii. (Table of Contents):
"Letter XXI.—<i>Currency</i> or <i>Colonial-born</i> population."
Ibid. p. 33:
"Our colonial-born brethren are best known here by the name of <i>Currency</i>, in contradistinction to <i>Sterling</i>, or those born in the mother-country. The name was originally given by a facetious paymaster of the 73rd Regiment quartered here—the pound currency being at that time inferior to the pound sterling."
1833. H. W. Parker, `Rise, Progress, and Present State of Van Diemen's Land,' p. 18:
"The Currency lads, as the country born colonists in the facetious nomenclature of the colony are called, in contradistinction to those born in the mother country."
1840. Martin's `Colonial Magazine,' vol. iii. p. 35:
"Currency lady."